


growing pains

by OrangePatrick



Series: that modern domestic au [1]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Original Trilogy, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Domestic, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Family Bonding, M/M, Moving, anakin is a LOVING and CARING father
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-23
Updated: 2016-02-23
Packaged: 2018-05-22 18:52:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,529
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6090702
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OrangePatrick/pseuds/OrangePatrick
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Anakin had walked out of college with not only a mountain of student loans but also as a widower with a pair of twins in his arms, he moved into the cheapest livable apartment within a two-mile radius of his workplace.</p><p>Fourteen years later, he realizes that maybe the three-bedroom apartment-- which had been upgraded from two bedrooms back when the twins turned five-- might be getting a bit too small.</p><p>[a piece of the modern domestic AU that rozlyn and i keep talking about]</p>
            </blockquote>





	growing pains

**Author's Note:**

  * For [bandsaremyfavorite](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bandsaremyfavorite/gifts).



> for Rozlyn, for no reason other than love.  
> -  
> CONTEXT:  
> 1\. Obi Wan is referred to as Ben (kind of obvious).  
> 2\. Implied that Padme dies during childbirth.  
> 3\. Ages get a little wonky: the twins are 14 in the beginning, and for this universe we've canoned Ahsoka as 9 years older than them. Anakin still became a father at 23, so that age difference stays the same, but we've also de-aged Ben so that he and Anakin are less 16-year-age-gap and more 7-ish-year-age-gap.

The other half of the bed is already made when Anakin drags himself up at 6:45 Friday morning. He drags on his black work jeans and contemplates not changing his t-shirt for a clean one, but he’s 37 years old now and he should really probably stop acting 23, so he puts on a fresh shirt and pulls on a grease-stained hoodie before padding out into the hall towards the bathroom.

Ahsoka is already leaning over the sink, staring intently in the mirror as she perfectly wings her second eye with liquid liner, hair pinned up and waiting to be braided. “Move over, Snips,” he grumbles, reaching around her for his toothbrush.

“Where  _ else _ am I supposed to do it?” she shoots back, capping the eyeliner and putting it back in her make-up bag, tossing him a smile before she steps aside to let him at the sink.

After he’s done with his morning bathroom routine, Anakin walks into the living room, stepping around Leia and Ben as they do their morning meditations and slapping Han Solo’s leg as he passes the sleeping teenager on the couch. Han jerks awake, and Leia cracks an eye open, a perfectly-curled hair falling into her eyes as she suppresses a laugh. Anakin isn’t entirely sure when Han started crashing on their couch, but it was sometime between the twins starting middle school and Ahsoka starting college.

Anakin follows the smell of eggs into the kitchen, forever thankful that his son has started making breakfast every morning. “Did you know,” he yawns, ruffling Luke’s hair before grabbing a stack of plates from the cupboard, “you’re my favorite son?”

“You might’ve mentioned it,” Luke teases, scooping some scrambled eggs onto the first plate his dad hands him.

Han is the next into the kitchen, taking a plate from the stack and kissing Luke on the forehead. “You are a blessing to this world, Luke.”

“Don’t touch my son,” Anakin says half-heartedly through a mouthful of food.

“Eat with your mouth closed,” Ben chides as he and Leia get their own breakfast plates.

Anakin shoots him a glare and makes a violent gesture with his fork, and Leia laughs. “Maybe you should start meditating with us, Dad. It might make you less vicious.”

“I’ve already heard this spiel from Ben plenty of times,” her father argues.

“It’s true. He was much more zen at 19.”

“Keep that up and I’m kicking you out!”

The morning banter continues, intensifying when Ahsoka refuses Luke’s scrambled eggs in favor of a bowl of chocolate Cocoa Puffs. It’s when Anakin notices that neither she nor Luke have room to sit at the cramped kitchen table, instead sitting up on the countertops, that it dawns on him. “We need a bigger house.”

He hadn’t noticed it before, not really, because everyone has such different schedules that they don’t always all eat dinner together, or Ben is gone for work, or Han is at his own house for a few days, or Ahsoka stays with friends for a weekend, but the apartment really isn’t big enough for all six-- six? Six?!-- of them to comfortably fit in. Han is sleeping on the couch, Ahsoka is sleeping on a trundle bed in Leia’s room, Ben crashes in Anakin’s bed, Luke’s room is hardly big enough to fit both a bed and a desk… Not to mention the one-and-a-half baths, which  _ really _ isn’t enough for all of them, especially weekday mornings.

“That’s… not a bad idea,” Ben admits, looking around the little kitchen.

Luke’s eyes are big and hopeful as he asks, “Like, a bigger apartment or a  _ house _ house?”

“I’ll think about it,” Anakin promises, getting up and starting to clear away everyone’s used dishes. “But you have school to get to.”

The next five minutes are a flurry of activity as everyone gathers their stuff together, Ahsoka sitting smugly on the couch because, yeah, maybe she gets up early for family breakfast, but her first college class isn’t until eight thirty, giving her an additional hour over the others.

Driving to the mechanical engineering firm in the gold Trans Am that he's had since his freshman year of college, Anakin weighs out the pros of owning a house versus the pricetag that comes on them. He finished paying off his student loans two years ago, but Ahsoka’s just about graduated from the local college, and while it’s considerably less expensive than the private university that Anakin went to, she’ll have loans to pay back, too… He promised Luke that he would think about it. So he thinks about it.

He and Ben spend the weekend casually checking online for houses in the area. Ben wakes up once in the middle of the night to Anakin getting out of bed. It’s been a few years since Anakin stopped getting horrendous nightmares, but that only makes him more concerned when he calls out, “Ani? You okay?”

“Go back to sleep, Ben.”

Ben Kenobi is all too familiar with that tone. He sits up and cards a hand through his hair. “Come talk about it.”

Anakin leans against the windowsill, ignoring the call back to bed, opting instead to stare out at the dark sky. “I… I just want what’s best for them, but I just… don’t know how to. There are too many things to consider, from Ahsoka being in college to changing finances to accommodate a house, and I just…”

“You aren’t doing this alone, Anakin,” Ben tells him, crawling out of bed to stand next to him. “And you’re doing so well with everything. You’ve been a great father.”

“I just don’t want them… growing up like I did.” He says this with a hint of embarrassment, quickly jerking away from Ben reaching out for him.

“Anakin.  _ Anakin _ . You have nothing to worry about.” Ben takes his hand, giving it a gentle tug. “Come back to bed. Everything will be okay, I promise.”

Anakin allows himself to follow the tug on his hand, lacing his fingers with Ben’s and curling up against the older man once he’s back under the warm covers. Ben had never broken a promise before, not really, so seeing the man so firmly supportive calms Anakin’s anxieties just enough to let him sleep through the rest of the night.

They start rebudgeting, putting away extra cash and being just a bit more careful with their spending. It takes a long time-- another year-- before Anakin feels ready to take the kids house hunting. They all pile into Ben’s mom-van-- all six of them-- and take tours of three houses in one day. To no one’s surprise, Leia, Luke, and Ahsoka each pick a different house as their favorite. Ben chooses House #1 with the large back porch, ideal for meditation in the mornings, while Han is just happy to be dragged along by the twins. Anakin takes in everyone’s reactions and thoughts and arguments, weighing out his options. (When Ben and Leia agree on House #1, Luke and Ahsoka immediately complain that of  _ course _ that’s going to be the one Dad picks! They’re his  _ favorites _ and he  _ always _ sides with them!)

(Anakin doesn’t  _ have _ favorites-- but he does end up voting for House #1. Luke makes a strong argument for House #2, with its spacious kitchen and wide dining room, while Ahsoka argues that House #3 has more character and is more homely, but both grudgingly agree that none of the options are  _ bad _ .)

Four months later, after carrying the last of Luke’s boxes into his new bedroom, Han observes, “It’s still a three-bedroom house, though. Not that I’m upset about having a couch to sleep on!”

Luke grins, apparently knowing something that Han doesn’t. “Don’t worry about it.”

A few minutes later, Anakin and Ben push in a large piece of metal bedframe. “We’ll carry the stuff inside,” Ben huffs, “but you two have to put it together.”

Han blinks in shock when he realizes that the framework is too tall for a regular bed. “You got a new bed?”

“Bunk beds!” Luke cheers, pulling the frame up against the wall. “You can sleep in my room now, instead of on the couch!”

Across the hall, Ahsoka and Leia divide up space in a larger room, each of their full-sized beds pushed against opposite walls with a large bay window stretching between them. Anakin stops in the doorway, a subconscious smile quirking his lips. Leia’s hair is getting long, pulled back in braids in such a fashion that remind him of her mother.

“You need any help, Skyguy?” Ahsoka asks, noticing him.

“What? Oh, no, I just…” Anakin shrugs. “I’m happy.”

Leia throws a pillow at him and laughs. “Go unpack your own stuff,” she tells him just as Ben calls, “Anakin, help me with these mattresses!”

He rolls his eyes and heads back to the driveway, back to settling in. The May sun is starting to set, air still warm with the promise of incoming summer. Ben is smiling, blue eyes bright, and with a deep breath, Anakin knows everything is going to be okay. Better than okay.

  
Things are going to be great.

**Author's Note:**

> un'beta'ed, so all mistakes are my own. point out anything glaringly wrong.  
> as always, kudos+comments are appreciated<3


End file.
